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The worst budget pain could come from a strongly rumoured trimming of the late-night hours of some bus routes. Details might not be known until TTC officials brief the budget committee on Friday. (Steve Russell / Toronto Star)

The mayor has asked departments to cut spending by 5 per cent, equivalent to $46 million on the operating budget alone. Councillors and reporters will be handed a list of proposed “expenditure reductions.” (The word “cuts” will not be used.)

One city source said most of the reductions “will be so small you wouldn’t even really call them cuts,” while acknowledging a host of user fees, for recreation activities and other city services, are set to rise. Already revealed are plans to hike fees for garbage pickup (reduced rebate for small bin, hikes between $9 and $14 for bigger bins), water rates (about $50 for the average family) and a fine for a “nuisance or malicious” false fire alarm (from $1,050 to $1,230).

The worst budget pain could come from a strongly rumoured trimming of the late-night hours of some bus routes. Details might not be known until TTC officials brief the budget committee on Friday.

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So why is Ford tossing away most of the 2011 budget blueprint he unveiled during the election campaign, and not waging the war on waste he has spent a decade demanding?

Politics, of course, but also time. Ford wants to do a stem-to-stern probe of city expenses and programs. Bureaucrats have been working furiously just to get the budgets done; a quick review of the huge organization was ruled out.

The mayor agreed with advice that he should get both the operating and capital plans done in a compressed cycle — launched, debated and voted upon in six weeks, less time than is normally spent on operating alone.

That has rankled Ford foes including Councillor Adam Vaughan.

“We have to start making motions to fix the budget as soon as it’s presented,” Vaughan says. “Never before will Toronto budgets have been passed so fast, and with so little input from politicians and the public.

“If there are no cuts, that’s not such a problem. If a library (at Metro Hall) is going to be closed, a (proposed) bed-bug program cut, it’s a big problem.”

Vaughan and other left-leaning councillors who supported former mayor David Miller will be huddled with the documents trying to quickly determine if Ford has failed to fulfill his promise to avoid “major” service cuts.

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But deep cuts aren’t expected until next year’s budget. Staff and councillors will get the month of March to recover from the often-emotional deliberations and then, sources say, be plunged April 1 into 2012 budget preparations with a December deadline for both capital and operating plans.

That will leave plenty of time for bruising debate on major cuts that Ford’s office has already determined will be necessary — even after the fat and gravy are gone — to get Toronto on a firm financial footing, ending the huge “structural deficits” that plague the city every year. His election platform promises the amassing of a $1.7 billion surplus by 2014.

This year, Ford will keep blood off the floor only by plowing virtually all of a one-time surplus from 2010 straight into the operating budget, rather than diverting some of the windfall to dwindling reserves or Toronto’s $3 billion debt.

The most recent figures put the 2010 surplus at more than $300 million, plus $75 million tucked away earlier. There are strong indications, though, that more money has been found and the half-billion-dollar deficit for 2011 is no longer considered a problem.

Still, Ford isn’t about to enjoy a skate across the City Hall rink.

While the mayor’s office exerts tight control of city departments through the city manager and his hand-picked committee chairs, there are numerous arm’s-length agencies, boards, commissions and corporations that will be harder to tame.

The library board is asking for a 2.6 per cent hike, the police services board for 3 per cent, and some of the others may follow suit with requests for hikes instead of cuts this week.

The Toronto Parking Authority doesn’t have 5 per cent of fat to cut, said Gerry Daigle, vice-president of finance for the agency that operates the “green P” parking lots and on-street metered parking.

The TPA will instead promise to hike revenues to the city by an equivalent amount, or $4,564,000, he said.

Asked how the authority will wring the extra money out of motorists, Daigle said: “Our plan is always to maximize our revenue, but it depends a lot on the economy. So we’ll see.”

Members of the public are invited to make deputations on the budgets at the civic centres for North York and East York on Jan. 19, and those of Scarborough and York the following day. Council is scheduled to put the 2011 budgets to bed by Feb. 28.

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